Taxi Driver Online

Thames Valley Police and partner agencies have conducted a number of checks on licensed taxis in Buckinghamshire.

On Monday 26 March Thames Valley Police (TVP) took part in an operation in High Wycombe with Wycombe District Council, Aylesbury Vale District Council and the DVSA (Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency) to conduct checks on private hire and Hackney carriage vehicles and drivers.

40 vehicles were stopped and checked in total; 31 private hire vehicles and 9 Hackney carriage vehicles.

Vehicles were checked for defects by the DVSA and for insurance and MOT by Thames Valley Police. Aylesbury Vale and Wycombe councils checked that the vehicle standards expected for valid licences were being met. Taxi and driving licence checks were also conducted with the drivers.
Private hire vehicles in Wycombe and Aylesbury Vale are required to display exterior signage which includes, rear licensing plate which must be fixed to the outside rear of the vehicle and side door stickers stating that journeys must be pre-booked. Aylesbury Vale also requires that a front licensing plate is displayed in the windscreen.

Private hire and Hackney carriage drivers are required to wear their driver ID badge and for it to be visible to the passengers. They are not allowed to smoke in their vehicles at any time and must have visible ‘No Smoking’ signs.

Four vehicles were given immediate prohibitions, meaning issues must be rectified immediately, for defects to indicators and detached anti-roll bars. Four vehicles were issued with delayed prohibitions for a variety of issues including seatbelts not working and worn vehicle parts.

The council suspended licences for these vehicles due to the defects, thereby taking unsafe vehicles off of the road.

TVP also issued a seatbelt ticket to one driver who was sat on it and a mobile phone ticket to a member of the public.

doesn't say if hack or PH

The councils dealt with a further 18 drivers for licensing offences, which included drivers not wearing ID badges, not displaying correct vehicle signage, having damage to the vehicles and failing to have a fire extinguisher. They were given warnings and given seven days in which to rectify any defects found or face further action.

PC Liz Johnson, Thames Valley Police Road Safety Officer, said:
“This was a successful operation and removed unsafe vehicles from the road. I would urge all drivers to check their vehicles on a daily basis and any fare paying passengers to ensure the driver has their identity badge clearly visible and licence plate in date. If you have any concerns about either a vehicle or driver then please do report it to the relevant licensing authority.”

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Yes, members of the public are checking the date on plates *all* the time.

Some Licensing Authorities allow vehicles to run around with the plate weeks out of date,again doing things by post or other means is not the way forward for what is supposed to be a safe and secure industry.

Yes, in Fife plates can be months out of date - saw one recently that was three months past the expiry date.

In fact I'm not shocked at all, because don't normally look at them, because know some will be out of date. Don't know about down south, but the Scottish legislation allows renewal applications right up to date of expiry, thus since it takes a few weeks to process the application and issue the licence and plates, then some will always be out of date. If the plate is renewed annually then maybe 20% of the time the plate will be out of date.

And since I think the legislation gives the council six months to process the application, in theory the plate could be six months out of date.

Daft system if you ask me - I think Dundee uses the vehicle inspection date for the plates, so if an out of date plate is seen then that indicates a problem. The old Fife plates weren't dated, and would last the life of the vehicle, assuming it didn't fall off in the meantime. Can't see what was wrong with that system, particularly when everyone accepts there will be out of date plates around, so no one really pays attention. When the system was first changed drivers were phoning the council to complain if they saw an out of date plate, but as the years went on everyone realised what was going on, so all a tad pointless having the dates on the plates.

Which also underlines that the public never look at the plates either.

Could say more, but you never know who could be reading

If a license runs out here then that’s the end of the license, no grace period whatsoever.

Many have been caught out by the age limit. As they can’t renew a license that has elaspsed they have to start afresh, so if the age of the vehicle is older than the max new age for vehicles, it doesn’t get licensed.

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IDFIMH

Same here in essence, I suspect.

Note that I wasn't talking about applications after the expiry date, but those made legally at the last minute before expiry (ie the vast majority, I suspect), so since it takes weeks to process it and issue the new plates (and badges) then there will always be out of date ones around.

Do not understand why it takes weeks to process a renewal application for vehicle license,surely when you apply to renew the license you have to show all the relevant documents before the test so a plate should be ready to issue on vehicle passing test.

Not entirely sure either, but inspections tests in Fife all take place at the same time of the year, so the licence renewal date is unrelated to the inspection date.

The council undertakes all the vetting stuff, so that will only be set in train once the application is received, thus could take several weeks for that alone.

And if the renewal needs to go before the committee then that will take longer still although, as I said, by law they must decide within six months of the renewal application. If there are council elections or councillors are on recess ( ) that could easily prolong a committee hearing by a few weeks. (Although there are presumably emergency procedures in certain cases.)

Of course, there may just be an administrative backlog or whatever at certain times, thus take a while to process - suspect most leave the application until the last minute, so if they all arrive at once then staff unable to process them all at once.